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TEN COMMANDMENT WEEKEND UPDATE: In the event 3ABN hasn't been restored on Sky Angel by May 5 & 6, Sky Angel has graciously agreed to air 3ABN on Channel 9702 from 7:00 PM ET to Midnight on May 5th and from 9:00 AM ET to 9:00 PM ET on May 6th.

That's not the point. 3ABN is free through one source, but yet Sky Angel does not also make 3ABN FTA through their system. They charge you money for something that is already free.

Yeah, you missed the point. It all costs money. Buy a receiver and dish. You would need C band for some of the FREE stuff. Get them free? Send in your donations so we can keep it FREE. Of course, Sky Angel has no operating costs or do they?

We here at Sky Angel do our best to provide you, our valued subscribers, the quality service you deserve, and we want to thank you for your continued patience during this difficult time.

We continue to work with EchoStar to restore the channels that are still experiencing technical difficulties. Though we believe it may be technically feasible to restore these channels, there remain other issues that must be worked out with EchoStar before restoration is possible. We are working as quickly as possible to resolve these issues. Regrettably there is no assurance at this time that we will be able to do so.

Please understand our call center representatives have no further information to give you at this time. Sky Angel asks our subscribers, and programmers for their prayers and support as we try to deal with this unfortunate situation.

We apologize for the inconvenience and thank you for your understanding.

My highlighting in bold there, not theirs.

It MAY be feasable for the stations to return but no assurance?

My local TBN has received permission to flash cut to DTV. Most likely they will multicast channels of interest. Each subscriber needs to make their own decision on this issue. There is no guarantee that transponder 25 will not be hit by the same "technical issue"and another three channels will disappear. Actually we have had very little information at all except noting the outage.

From what I understand, Sky Angel charges subscribers so that they don't have to charge (most?) programmers. The vast majority (if not all) Christian networks would have to pay to be carried on Dish or DirecTV, but SA* gives them airtime at no cash cost (only some ads promoting SA* must be carried). The subscriber fee covers the costs of doing business, plus (I assume) a small fee for commercial networks like Hallmark, HGTV, FNC.

I have noticed that Sky Angel has recently started to sell airtime on Angel One, but I still get the impression that they give away more than they sell.
Most other Christian networks, even though they regularly raise funds through voluntary contributions, also usually have some airtime that is directly sold to other ministries.

From what I understand, Sky Angel charges subscribers so that they don't have to charge (most?) programmers. The vast majority (if not all) Christian networks would have to pay to be carried on Dish or DirecTV, but SA* gives them airtime at no cash cost (only some ads promoting SA* must be carried). The subscriber fee covers the costs of doing business, plus (I assume) a small fee for commercial networks like Hallmark, HGTV, FNC.

I have noticed that Sky Angel has recently started to sell airtime on Angel One, but I still get the impression that they give away more than they sell.Most other Christian networks, even though they regularly raise funds through voluntary contributions, also usually have some airtime that is directly sold to other ministries.

To my knowledge, Skyangel does not charge the programmers on their system for the spots on the bird.. meaning Spirit, TVU, Liberty, Gardian, etc is all up there at their own cost (getting signal to Skyangel -- most are up on Cband or KU so that is not a big deal) I beleive the only requirement is to run spots for skyangel on their radio or tv channels...

Yeah I noticed they are attempting to sell time on angel one, I guess it makes sense, since they do not ask for donations to keep angel one on, like the other relgious programmers do. Plus I would suspect that skyangel is starting to think seriously about the future, they are building a new uplink center in Cleveland TN and I suspect they have come to reality that they cant munch off Echostar forever..

As you may already be aware, on April 14th, Good Friday, we experienced a sudden loss of programming on 10 of our 36 channels. EchoStar Communications Corp., owner of the DISH Network satellite service, communicated to us that this loss was due to a technical failure of its EchoStar III satellite that we are currently sharing with EchoStar per a technical agreement we have with the company. We were successful in working with EchoStar to get seven of our 10 channels back on the air fairly quickly. Regrettably, three channels were not reinstated, and this technical failure evolved into contractual issues with EchoStar that, due to confidentiality restrictions in our agreement, we cannot publicly discuss. Unfortunately, despite our best efforts, we were unable to negotiate through the issues and are now prohibited from reinstating the channels that carried Three Angels Broadcasting, Golden Eagle Broadcasting and SPIRIT. Now that there is finality concerning our negotiations with EchoStar and it is certain that we will not be able to provide these three channels at this time, I wanted you to understand the reason.
In His service,